Syrians suffer patchy electricity supply as summer heat pushes up demand

Retired Syrian horticulturist Sahar Salam switches on a car battery in her single-room apartment in the Syrian capital Damascus whenever electricity goes out.

The battery has enough power to charge mobile phones and turn on a small LED light when electricity goes out in the Zahra neighbourhood near the city centre.

Sahar used to subscribe to a generator owned by a neighbourhood private operator until authorities curbed their use three years ago.

Although fuel shortages contributed to the demise of generators, some Damascus residents say the import of solar panels, mainly from China, is monopolised by businessmen linked to the ruling elite.

“A solar system costs at least $1,000 and anyway there is no place left for one on the roof,” Sahar said.

Massive power cuts are one of the main components of the war economy and infrastructure collapse in Syria since the country was plunged into civil war in late 2011.

The previous March, a revolt broke out against President Bashr Al Assad. Security forces suppressed the demonstrations, igniting a violent backlash and an eventual takeover by militants of the armed resistance to the president.

Although Russian intervention in 2015 has helped Mr Assad restore significant territory, large parts of the country remain outside his control.

This contributes to making the electricity shortages uneven across the country.

Syria is producing 2,000 megawatts of electricity, compared with 5,800mw in 2010, official figures show.

It is not clear whether current production includes areas outside central government control.

Sahar says there has been no “constant average” to how many hours a day are covered by state electricity, which costs at least 8 cents per kilowatt hour.

No average supply

“Sometimes it comes for one hour before cutting out for five hours. Other times it comes for two hours then cuts out for six or seven,” says Sahar, who is aged in her 40s.

The start of summer means shortages could become worse as load on the network rises.

Sahar, who lives with her 16-year-old son, quit her job several years ago and sought retirement benefits because she could not afford the cost of transport to work. Her husband has been missing since 2012, when he was detained at a military intelligence roadblock.

Her salary is equivalent to $15 a month. Her brother, a civil engineer who fled to Germany, supports her periodically.

Her situation, she says, remains “much better” than those living in the outskirts of the city, where poverty can be even more severe and state electricity comes for one to two hours a day, although the clampdown on generators has been less strict.

Generator operators require links with the local powerbrokers, and sometimes with more senior figures, to guarantee continuity of their business, one merchant who relies on generators said.

“Many times giving a commission only to the local chieftain does not work, because the regime might change him,” says the merchant, who lives on the southern outskirts of Damascus.

The authorities blame Western sanctions for the electricity shortages. The sanctions were imposed on the president, his wife and his inner circle in response to the 2011 crackdown, and were gradually expanded, culminating on the US side with the 2020 Caesar Act.

The legislation was partly designed to deprive Mr Assad of a war dividend through reconstruction.

But Jihad Yazigi, editor of The Syria Report, a business and economic newsletter based in Paris and Beirut, says the primary reason for the electricity shortages is that Moscow, Mr Assad’s most powerful ally, has not helped his government repair gas processing plants and related infrastructure that Russian companies mainly built before 2011.

“Russia is not into the reconstruction of Syria without knowing who would foot the bills,” Mr Jihad says.

Mr Yazigi says “the Russians are not as invested” in Syria as Iran, the main supplier of fuel oil and other oil products to regime areas, which is helping Mr Assad restore some electricity generation capacity.

“Syria has enabled Iran to become a (de facto) Mediterranean country,” says Mr Yazigi. Russia does feel the need to get involved much more than on the military side.”

But in some areas outside regime control, the electricity picture appears better.

Ahmad Sheikh, a trader in the town of Atma, which is within the Turkish zone of control in Syria, says electricity from Turkey comes for 24 hours a day and costs 22 cents per kilowatt hour, with payment through prepaid cards.

The cost remains expensive for many of the millions of internally displaced Syrians and refugees in the Turkish zone, and the Turkish network has not reached areas that are relatively far from the border, residents say.

“Electricity-wise in Atma, it feels like we’re in Dubai,” Mr Sheikh says.